Hacker hits Canadian prime minister

A hacker hit the website of Canada’s ruling Conservative Party on Tuesday morning, spreading a false report that Prime Minister Stephen Harper had been rushed to the hospital with a piece of hash-brown lodged in his throat.

“There was unauthorized access: The story is absolutely false. We do have our IT people looking into this immediately. They’ll be going through it to figure out what’s going on,” Conservative spokesman Fred DeLorey told Postmedia News.

The false report had Harper being rushed to Toronto General Hospital following “an incident at breakfast.”

“According to staff at the hospital, Harper was brought in via helicopter early this morning after his wife called 911,” said the false report. “He was eating breakfast with his kids when a piece of hash-brown lodged in his throat, blocking air from reaching his lungs.

“A member of his security team happened to be nearby, and immediately began to apply first aid.”

The real story of the Prime Minister’s morning was without drama. “Prime Minister Harper took his daughter to school this morning and came into work on Parliament Hill,” his press secretary Andrew MacDougall told reporters.

It was the second time Prime Minister Harper has been taken for a ride on the Internet.

During the 2009 global environment summit at Copenhagen, a group of pranksters called The Yes Men put out an ersatz release from the Canadian federal government.

The “release” announced a far-reaching program to cut Canada’s carbon emissions and help Third World countries control their air pollution. Several of the “announcements” were of programs that Harper’s government was actively resisting. The Prime Minister’s office reacted with ill-concealed anger.

The latest false report appeared on the Conservative Party website early Tuesday morning. It was noticed around 8:30 a.m. and quickly taken down.